4 Concepts for Collages, Diptychs, Album Pages, etc.

When you assemble a book template, diptych, triptych or collage in Photoshop (or other editing software), do you arrange them so they work together or do you just pop them in? In this post, I want to talk about the things to consider when assembling an attractive collection of images that can work together nicely.

{Colours}

You can compile images into a collage that aren’t necessarily from the same session or of the same topic. They can complement one another through the use of color schemes or even be edited to look similar even if they’re strikingly different for a quirky feel. The image below is taken from a vol25 album template with photography by Jen Johner. The images are so different yet work beautifully together in this collage:

{Looking inward}

I always make sure that my album pages and collages are compiled with the images looking inward. For the viewer, it can be very uncomfortable to see an album page where the subject is looking in a direction that falls off the edge of the page. For example, see the triptych below and you may agree that the boy’s gaze which goes outside of the collage (the right image) doesn’t feel right. He’s not engaged with the other images. At times, I will mirror images in Photoshop by selecting “edit > transform > flip horizontal” to keep all the images engaged with the center of the collage.

{Leaning}

Much like the example above, I love to use images that lean into one another. This gives the sense that they are engaging with one another and just small parts of the ‘big picture’ as it were. I love the example below where every image seems to be (ever so slightly) engaging with the other through body language:

{Progress}

I particularly love using Diptychs to communicate progression or movement. Especially when they are created using images that wouldn’t make much sense if viewed alone (as in the first example below). In the second, combining the two images gives the viewer the sense that the subject is walking towards them.

As you can tell, I love combining images. But I also know when to display my strongest work alone as as not to crowd the image. Experiment with different methods for displaying images together to tell a story or convey an idea. You might just get hooked too!